Zócalo Group town square blog

Ideas, insights & Inspiration that drive recommendations.

Mar18

Square Smarts

Welcome to another edition of Square Smarts. This week’s edition focuses on how social media is affecting the way people experience the Tsunami disaster in Japan, in addition to recapping key takeaways from South By Southwest. Now on to the Smarts…

Experiencing the Tsunami through Social Media

Social Networks as Major Resource for Tsunami Survivors – Perhaps one of the scariest parts of the Japan disaster is how it hits to home. The country is economically thriving and citizens that were affected by the natural disaster are people just like you and me. This blog post from the New York Times discusses how social media took on a new function after the tsunami, with people using the technology to find loved ones and exchange information. A bright idea – considering one out of every 10 people in Japan are on Twitter.

Texting Donations More Popular Than Ever - This article from Time discusses the evolution of the text donation, and challenges whether or not the phenomenon overall helps or hurts donation efforts. While people enjoy the immediacy of the text factor, donations are typically a flat fee of ten dollars, whereas average online donations for organizations like the Salvation Army range from an average of $150-170. However, since last Friday donation efforts are already at 1.6 million through REDCROSS texts sent to 90999. Not too shabby.

The Aftermath of SXSW

Key Takeaways from the Big Event – Last week we dove into the ideas of what SXSW was all about. This article from SmartBlog on Social Media does a good job summing up some of the key takeaways after the event was all said and done, including that small-group networking was all the rage with GroupMe sparking the most buzz, and that games are an extremely big opportunity for brands when it comes to engagement.

New Study Shows Likes Equal More Moolah Than Tweets

Study from EventBrite shows Likes More Profitable than Tweets – This Mashable article revolves around a study by EventBrite, who announced that an average tweet about an event drove 80 cents in ticket sales during the past six months, whereas an average Facebook Like drove $1.34. Perhaps even more interesting to note, the study also showed that people shared Eventbrite events on Facebook almost four times as often as they did on Twitter. While this seems pretty specific to event-going and more information is needed before saying Likes are more valuable than Tweets, it certainly is a new step in the social media ROI direction…

Creative Viral Strategy – Keeping it real?

Real or Fake Viral Video Question Stirs Up Chatter - The New York Times wrote this article on the latest viral video sensation involving high-jacking video screens in Times Square. The video has captured more than 1 million hits in the past week. There was widespread question over whether the video was staged… And yes, it was in fact staged by a company called Thinkmodo that specializes in making videos ” that viewers will think are clever and authentic without overtly pushing or mentioning a product”. Check out the video and decide for yourself – does it matter if it’s “real” if it’s generating buzz?